[KLUG Advocacy] Comments on MSO 8.0/97 compat: Corel WPO 2002+SP3 v. StarOffice 6.0+patches???

[Bryan J. Smith]

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[ I know, KLUG-Advo might not be the right place for this.  Just trying
to hit the most people in one post.  Remove the CC if you like. ]

First off, I assume most of you are running either:
- OpenOffice 1.0.x, or commercial off-spring (StarOffice 6.0, etc...)
- Microsoft Office 8.0 (97), 9.0 (2000), 10.0 (XP)
- Microsoft Works w/Word

I'm curious if anyone out there is running Corel WordPerfect Office 2002
(Standard or Pro) _on_Windows_, especially if they have updated to the
latest Service Pack 3?  I looked at it a year ago on someone else's
system, and read the reviews, but didn't spend much time with it.

I'm looking at grabbing some of the sub-$20 OEM CDs available for my
personal systems/portables that also boot Windows.  I'm very much
anti-piracy, plus I am trying to avoid forking out mega-$$$ to purchase
copies of Microsoft Office 8.0 (97) which is only for my employer.  I
have no need for it in my personal/professional pursuits outside of it.

So, I was wondering if you could answer the following questions ...

1)  How is its Microsoft Office 8.0 (97) document/template
compatibility?  Specifically Word, Excel and PowerPoint?  Versus latest
Open/StarOffice?

I remember the original Ziff-Davis review a year ago gave it 5 out of 5
because it's Office 8.0 (97) document compatibility was _better_ than
Microsoft Office 10.0 (XP).

2)  Since it includes Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications, how well
does it support Microsoft Word and Excel documents/templates with
embedded macros?

Is it a lot better than Open/StarOffice and close to MS Office thanx to
VBA?  Or not really and any embedded VB will require
modification/rewrite when pulled into WPO?

3)  How about Microsoft Office 9.0 (2000)?

Just trying to accomodate newer formats.  I'm not expecting much beyond
8.0/97, which would be quite sufficient for me.  It's hard to hit those
"moving targets," although I'm sure a few things have improved thanx to
Microsoft funding.

4)  How does it run under Windows ME?  XP?

I have ME on my notebook (because that's what came with it, and I don't
like to change what is pre-installed on notebooks).  I have XP on my
home systems.  Comments?  I see a lot of XP fixes in SP3.

Thanx in advance ...

-- Bryan

P.S.  I've always been a closet fan of Corel because of their document
compatibility with _all_ of their old versions.  I don't plan on
creating any new documents in Corel formats, and am largely interested
in MS Office compatibility.  Largely pitting it against Open/StarOffice,
especially since it comes with VBA and Corel has been funded by
Microsoft in the last year.

P.P.S.  Their recent buyout of Micrografx also intrigues me.  Makes me
wonder if any of those file formats are also supported.  I assume not
since the buyout came later, and might only affect the Draw series
anyway.


--=20
Bryan J. Smith, E.I. (BSECE)       Contact Info:  http://thebs.org
[ http://thebs.org/files/resume/BryanJonSmith_certifications.pdf ]
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